Clarissa loves cars, trains and aeroplanes, collected from surprise eggs and as gifts.
She loves tomica cars.
Her first tomica was gifted by her Si-yi and Gor-gor. She keeps the box too, despite me asking many times, if she's ok to throw the box away.
I guess it's like a catalogue for her, because she'd refer to the box and point at the cars she doesn't have in her collection, and tell me she wants it next.
By now I think she has some 8 or 9 tomica cars.
She'd line them up, one box next to the other, and stack the car on top of each corresponding box.
It's very neat and looks like a good toy car showroom. 😆
One of her Christmas gifts last year was this Well Done stamp gifted by her Da-yi and Ah-ah.
The cars keep her occupied and sometimes she plays on her own quite well, stacking the cars and driving her animal friends around, while I'm in the living room with her but attending to Meimei.
Recently I helped her pack her toys and took a closer look at her tomica cars.
I was wondering why the nemo car has turned orange all over.. when I realised many of the cars have some orange stains on them.
So I tried to wash the stains off with soap, with toothpaste, with dish washing liquid.
But they remained.
I showed them to her and asked her, why are your cars orange?
She looked at me and said to me, nonchalantly:
Oh, I give them the well done chop!
Hahahaha omg.
I told her I couldn't wash the stains off now and she told me it's ok. She didn't mind at all.
So as a logical and inquisitive adult i asked her why she printed the well done chop on the cars.
Because they well done lor!
Lol why did I even bother to ask.
😂😂😂
Sigh as long as she still plays with them I guess.
And that's what happens when you leave kids to play on their own, not 100% supervised.
And it's ok!
It's important for them to be bored and know how to deal with boredom.
Though these days I try to do this lol.
Especially during the 6pm chaos.
Keep calm, ask bubs1 to color something and watch her while carrying bubs2.
(For the record I actually managed to make bubs2 sleep while at it though she only slept for 20 minutes. 😆)
Or read a storybook to both. 😄
But yeah Jiejie is learning and getting better at doing things on her own while waiting.
There was one evening when she automatically picked a few books on her own and sat on my bed to read.. while I took a shower.
She simply looked up and smiled at me when I joined her in bed.
There are still times when she would announce sadly, "No one play with me" or sit in front of her room door sadly and tell me, "Mummy I waited so long for you" after I was done attending to a fussing Meimei.
I guess we all need to learn.
For her, the art of giving and sharing.
Her parents' and Yaya's attention and time, with her sister.
For us, the art of balancing.
She gets jealous sometimes, but it's not very serious and sometimes pretty funny.
Yesterday I was sitting down with her while she ate her jelly when Meimei suddenly gave a loud cry from her rocker/chair.
I looked over and said, "Are you alright honey?"
Immediately Clarissa pointed out to me, "No she's not honey!"
I was a little surprised because I call the girls "darling" or "honey" quite interchangeably all the time.
"Oh, then who's honey?" I asked her, amused.
"I'm honey! You call me honey," she said. Matter of fact.
"Then what do I call Meimei?" I asked again.
"You call her Risa Lin!" She answered, and laughed.
She laughed because Risa Lin is what we call HER (short for Clarissa) when she's up to some mischief and we try to stop her by calling out her name.
Lol. Indirectly implying that Meimei is the naughty one?
The face of a serial cat napper.
Her day time naps are really quite bad.
And so I don't get to nap too.
I've switched my schedule for more than a week now.
Pumping 4 times a day with the last pump at around 930-10pm after Clarissa sleeps and a middle of the night pump at around 330am.
For the past two nights though I over slept by 20 minutes and both times she woke up while I was in the middle of pumping.
So I stopped everything to attend to her, feed her, change her diaper and make her sleep before I returned to finish pumping.
By the time I'm done it's usually past 5am and I'd drift off to sleep until Clarissa comes looking for me when she wakes up around 630-7.
I'd get up and go to her room / our room, and watch her drink milk before she gets changed.
And then I go back to sleep until 8ish-9.
And that's about all the sleep I get.
Getting used to it! 💪
Weekends are harder because that 6ish-8ish am sleep is not possible at all. 😂
So Mondays are for recuperating from weekends lol.
This girl deserves a big hug today.
Played on her own while I showered.
And after I was done, I asked if I could carry Meimei for a while to let Yaya have a break, she said yes readily.
"Later you come back ok?" Was all she asked of me.
weeirdism 